As we have mentioned before (pp. 242, 3), Ovid’s _Metamorphoses_ are the chief source to which, from his time downwards, poets in general have applied for their most imaginative and popular mythic illustrations; and to him especially have Emblem writers been indebted. For a fact so well known a single instance will suffice; it is the description of Chaos and of the Creation of the World (bk. i. fab. 1),— “Ante mare et terras, et quod tegit omnia, cœlum, Unus erat toto naturæ vultus in orbe, Quem dixêre Chaos: rudis indigestaque moles.” An early Italian Emblematist, Gabriel Symeoni, in 1559, presents on this subject the following very simple device in his _Vita et Metamorfoseo d’Ovidio_ (p. 12), accompanied on the next page by “The creation and confusion of the world,”— Il Caos. [Illustration: _Symeoni, 1559._] “_Prima fuit rerum confusa sine ordine moles, Vnaq. erat facies sydera, terra, fretum._” [Sidenote: _i.e._] “First was there a confused mass of things without order, And one appearance was stars, earth, sea.” But Ovid’s lines are applied in a highly figurative sense, to show the many evils and disorders of injustice. A wild state where wrong triumphs and right is unknown,—that is the Chaos which Anulus sets forth in his “PICTA POESIS” (p. 49); _Without justice, confusion_. SINE IVSTITIA, CONFVSIO. [Illustration: _Aneau_, 1555.] SI TERRAE _Cœlum ſemiſceat: & mare cœlo. Sol Erebo. Tenebris lumina, Terra Polo. Quattuor & Mundi mixtim primordia pugnent. Arida cum ſiccis, algida cum calidis. In Chaos antiquum omnia denique confundantur: Vt cùm ignotus adhuc mens Deus orbis erat. Eſt Mundanarum talis confuſio rerum. Quo Regina latet Tempore Iuſtitia._ [Sidenote: _i.e._] “If with earth heaven should mingle and the sea with heaven, The sun with Erebus, light with darkness, the earth with the pole, Should the four elements of the world in commixture fight, Dry things with the moist and cold things with the hot, Into ancient chaos at last all things would be confounded As when God as yet unknown was the soul of the globe. Such is the confusion of all mundane affairs, At what time soever Justice the queen lies concealed.” Whitney (p. 122), borrowing this idea and extending it, works it out with more than his usual force and skill, and dedicates his stanzas to Windham and Flowerdewe, two eminent judges of Elizabeth’s reign,—but his amplification of the thought is to a great degree peculiar to himself. Ovid, indeed, is his authority for representing the elements in wild disorder, and the peace and the beauty which ensued,— “When they weare dispos’d, eache one into his roome.” The motto, dedication, and device, are these,—